Filed under: 2010 and 2012, General Politics | Tags: 2000, Electoral College, Washington
I just saw this post by Hendrik Herzelberg.
News flash: Last Tuesday, Governor Chris Gregoire of Washington State signedthe National Popular Vote bill, making her state the fifth to officially commit itself to the revolutionary idea of electing Presidents the way we elect other important holders of public office.
With Washington’s eleven electoral votes added to the fifty of Maryland, New Jersey, Illinois, and Hawaii, we’re now between a fifth and a quarter of the way to the 270 needed to make living, breathing human beings (rather than “artificial entities,” as Alexander Hamilton called states), the relevant unit in Presidential elections, just as they are in gubernatorial, congressional, mayoral, and dogcatcheral elections.
This is cool! And I think that all states need to move toward abolishing the electoral college system. BUT this doesn’t seem like the right way to do it. If I vote in Washington for a Democrat, and the Democrat wins in WA, but most of the rest of the country votes for a Republican, I don’t want my electoral votes going to the other guy. And look at the states that have the law – Washington, Maryland, Hawaii, New Jersey and Illinois – all states that reliably send all their electoral votes to the Democrat.
That said, I don’t think that the winner of the national popular vote should ever lose an election. But even in the cases of 2000 and 2004, there is value in showing accurate numbers of who won the election and how close the other guy was.
In 2004, for example, George W. Bush won 286 electoral votes (only 16 more than the 270 needed to win) and John Kerry won 251, only 19 shy of the magic number. If this law had been in effect, it would have been an electoral landslide, Bush: 347 to Kerry: 190. (well, not as much of a landslide as 2008.)
This just seems like an all or nothing deal. Either we get rid of the electoral college system altogether, or adhere to the rules that we’ve used for more than two centuries.
Filed under: 2008 Election, Barack Obama | Tags: 2008, Electoral College, Predictions
President
Senate
Filed under: 2008 Election, General Politics | Tags: 2008, Electoral College, U.S. States
This weekend, the New York Times published the map above, which shows the size of each state proportional to the power of one vote. In the electoral college system, a state cannot have fewer than three electoral votes, regardless of how small its population. As a result, one vote in the states with very small populations (Wyoming, North Dakota etc…) is worth more than a vote in states with larger popultions (California, New York etc…).
This is just another reason that the Electoral College system is outdated and should be disbanded. As I understand it, the system exists so that the electors can correct the popular choice if they think that it was wrongly decided. As far as I know, electors almost never vote differently than the area they are responsible for. If this were ever to happen, the electors should have switched the decision in 2000 based on the fact that Al Gore won the popular vote. But alas, we are in George Bush’s America eight years later.
Also, wouldn’t it be great if candidates campaigned for votes rather than states? By visiting states like Alabama and Kentucky, Democrats might be able to persuade some voters there that they have been Democrats this whole time without even knowing it. They had just never seen one in real life to make that clear.
There are so many benefits to disbanding the Electoral College system. But the most important is the fact that without the Electoral College, we can achieve the pure democracy that we seem to be so proud of.
So when on Tuesday are we going to know? Lets start with the numbers.
According to Politico, there are 18 states, totaling 234 electoral votes that will definitely go for Obama or are leaning in his direction. There are 19 states totaling 150 electoral votes that will definitely go for McCain. That means that Obama only needs 36 extra electoral votes from the remaining 13 swing states to win the election. Those states are listed below with their electoral vote value. The ones in blue are slightly leaning Obama, those in red are leaning McCain.
Total electoral votes in swing states: 134
Nevada (5)
New Mexico (5)
Colorado (9)
Pennsylvania (21)
Ohio (20)
Florida (27)
Virginia (13)
North Carolina (15)
New Hampshire (4)
Mossouri (11)
Indiana (11)
Arizona (10)
North Dakota (3)
If you just look at the swing states in which Obama is ahead by at least five points according to the most recent poll in that state (NM, CO, PA, OH, NH), then Barack Obama would win with at least 293 electoral votes with 75 electoral votes in swing states still up for grabs. If Obama sweeps the swing states in which he is ahead, then he would win with 353 electoral votes. This is unlikely to happen because it actually does seem like the race is getting closer in states like Virginia, North Carolina and Nevada.
So when will we know who won? To get those 36 votes that Barack Obama needs to win, I think that his bare bones best chances are winning Pennsylvania (21) and Ohio (20) to put him over the top. Polls close in Ohio at 7:30 ET and in Pennsylvania at 8:00 ET. So I am going to go ahead and predict that we will know the winner by 9:30 Eastern Time on Tuesday night. Of course, that estimate is dependent on how close things actually are in those states, and when the major cities (Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati) are counted.
Get excited.
Filed under: 2008 Election, General Politics | Tags: 2008, Bi-partisanship, Electoral College
It looks like McCain is the new Bush.
Though this is happening throughout the country, the clearest sign of the GOP’s discomfort with McCain is in Oregon. Trailing behind the Democrat Jeff Merkely, the Republican incumbent Gordon Smith has even emphasized his connections to Obama’s policies in campaign ads.
“Who says Gordon Smith helped lead the fight for better gas mileage and a cleaner environment,” a narrator asks. “Barack Obama.”
Granted, Oregon is more liberal than most states. So a Republican Senatorial candidate would typically run to the left in order to get elected. But this is happening across the country in states like North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wyoming. Conservative and liberal candidates alike have realized that Barack Obama is the most popular candidate since Bill Clinton and that he could help their chances to get elected, even in traditionally conservative districts.
This is strong proof that the politics of razor thin electoral margins and cultural antagonism that has prevailed in 2000 and 2004 is not our country’s default setting. Check out the website 270towin.com, which shows the electoral results of every election in history. As you can see, there were only a handful of elections in the twentieth century with miniscule margins (JFK v. Nixon, Carter v. Ford, Bush v. Gore). In fact, there are just as many in which one candidate has won overwhelmingly. Reagan won 489 electoral votes in 1980 and 525 in 1984. In 1962, Richard Nixon won every state except for Massachusetts. Even Bill Clinton, one of the most polarizing political figures by the end of his second term, won each of his elections by larger margins than Barack Obama is likely to.
Take this all into account and you realize that we agree more often than we disagree. We share the same goals more often than we strive for dominance. And everyone wants the United States to be great. We just have different ideas about how to keep it great. And it just so happens that in the past eight years, we have fought more often than usual. But if you take a step back and look at the big picture, that’s more of an aberration than anything else. And even in our most partisan episodes, as shown on the map above, the country as a whole is more purple than red or blue.
Ben Buchwalter 